Existing User

‘Tucumán Arde', 1968, third phase of the campaign: poster calling for the 1st Bienal de Arte de Vanguardia. Image courtesy Archivo Graciela Carnevale

A piece that is essentially the same as a piece made by any
of the first Conceptual artists, dated two years earlier than the
original and signed by somebody else. - Eduardo
Costa1

I

On 28 April 1999 the exhibition 'Global Conceptualism: Points of
Origin, 1950s-1980s' opened at New York's Queens Museum of Art.
Organised by Luis Camnitzer, Jane Farver and Rachel Weiss,
consisting of eleven geographically defined sections and curated by
a large, international group of art historians and researchers, the
exhibition formulated one of the riskiest and most controversial
interpretations of so-called Conceptual art at an international
level. The show was ambitious. Its structure created a geographical
spill-over that called into question the lesser or secondary place
to which certain critical productions had been consigned. The
framework of analysis was the global set of social and political
transformations that have taken place since 1950, and the emergence
of new forms of political action that formed the backdrop to a
renewed repertoire of visual language. Such a scope allowed the
curators to gather aesthetic proposals not defined in the
exhibition by a Conceptualist 'aesthetics of immateriality', but
instead by their capacity for intervention.2
This approach, without doubt, shifted the very rules according to
which the history of Conceptual art had been written. Those radical
changes of the modes of producing and giving
value to art exposed by 'Global Conceptualism' reveal complex
processes in which political subjectivities oppose the consensual
organisation of power and its distribution of places and roles,
mobilising singular and collective resistances and dissenting
energies.

Ten years on, the shockwaves can still be felt, perhaps even
more intensely than at the

Footnotes

The term 'dematerialisation', introduced by Lucy Lippard and
John Chandler in 1968, for a long time was used as the key term to
identify Conceptual art in North America and Western Europe. See
Lucy R. Lippard and John Chandler, 'The Dematerialization of Art',
Art International, vol.12, no.2, February 1968, pp.31-36
and Lucy R. Lippard (ed.), Six Years: The Dematerialization of
the Art Object from 1966 to 1972, New York: Praeger, 1973.↑

In Latin America those discussions happened around the Bienal de
La Habana, which, since its creation in 1984, has become an
important forum of discussion disengaged from the international art
market. Another significant moment at an international scale is the
coinciding in 1997 of documenta X, curated by Catherine David, and
the second Johannesburg Biennial, curated by Okwui Enwezor.↑

Luis Camnitzer points out that 'while "conceptual art" is an
anecdotal little label in the history of universal art,
"conceptualism" as a strategy created a rupture in the appreciation
of all art and in the behaviour of artists, regardless of their
location'. Fernando Davis, 'Entrevista a Luis Camnitzer: "Global
Conceptualism fue algo intestinal e incontrolable, al mismo tiempo
que presuntuoso y utópico"', Ramona, no.86, November 2008,
p.29. See also Rachel Weiss, 'Re-writing Conceptual Art',
Papers d'Art, no.93, 2007, pp.198-202. Translation the
author's.↑

As Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt remind us, these biopolitical
modes of production do not only involve the production of tangible
goods in a purely economic sense, but 'affect all spheres of
social, economic, cultural and political life, at the same time as
they produce them'. A. Negri and M. Hardt, 'Preface',
Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire,
Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 2001, p.xi.↑

Boris Groys has clearly expressed some of the effects of this
paradox in art: 'If life is no longer understood as a natural
event, as fate, as Fortuna, but rather as time artificially
produced and fashioned, then life is automatically politicised,
since the technical and artistic decisions with respect to the
shaping of the lifespan are always political decisions as well. The
art that is made under these new conditions of biopolitics - under
the conditions of an artificially fashioned lifespan - cannot help
but take this artificiality as its explicit theme. Now, however,
time, duration and thus life too cannot be shown directly but only
documented. The dominant medium of modern biopolitics is thus
bureaucratic and technological documentation, which includes
planning, decrees, fact-finding reports, statistical inquiries and
project plans. It is no coincidence that art also uses the same
medium of documentation when it wants to refer to itself as life.'
Boris Groys, 'Art in the Age of Biopolitics: From Artwork to Art
Documentation', Documenta 11_ Platform 5: Exhibition (exh.
cat.), 2002, p.109.↑

The issue also involves the critical modes of working around the
concepts that sustain these historiographic exercises. It is
possible to say, for instance, that to a certain extent 'Global
Conceptualism' adopted the task of the ethnologist, raking up
experiences in different geographies and marking its affinities and
Conceptualist identities, and yet, paradoxically, its strategy
facilitated the mise-en-critique of identity itself. An
acritical example of the identity discourse is provided by Álvaro
Barrios's book Orígenes del arte conceptual en Colombia
(1999), which offers a narrative made up of interviews in which
several leading figures of the 1960s and 70s guide the story's main
character (Barrios himself), who appears increasingly convinced of
his ability to truly recover the unrecognised Conceptualist
element. Álvaro Barrios, Orígenes del arte conceptual en
Colombia (1968-1978), Bogotá: Alcaldía Mayor de Bogotá,
1999.↑

Mari Carmen Ramírez, 'Blueprint Circuits: Conceptual Art and
Politics in Latin America', in Waldo Rasmussen, Fatima Bercht and
Elizabeth Ferrer (ed.), Latin American Artists of the Twentieth
Century (exh. cat.), New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1993,
pp.156-67.↑

The exhibition presented Latin American art production as a tame
continuation of modern Western aesthetic movements, avoiding any
type of political reflection on the colonial history of the
subcontinent. Most critics agreed in characterising it as a blatant
attempt to 'maintain a total control of the ideological and
aesthetic premises […] and of their interpretation' from categories
projected from the outside. Shifra M. Goldman, 'Artistas
latinoamericanos del siglo XX, MoMA' (trans. Magdalena Holguín),
ArtNexus, no.10, September-December 1993, pp.84-89.↑

Drawn up in 1989 and promoted by the International Monetary
Fund, the World Bank and the US Treasury Department, the Washington
Consensus is a list of measures for economic reform that presented
itself as the 'best' programme to face the crisis and
'underdevelopment' of Latin America, among which were
liberalisation of trade and investment, deregulation and a general
withdrawal of the state from economic matters.↑

Some of these debates, from a Latin American cultural
perspective opposed to European and North American dominance, can
be found in Gerardo Mosquera (ed.), Beyond the Fantastic:
Contemporary Art Criticism from Latin America, London: The
Institute of International Visual Arts, 1995.↑

Juan Pablo Renzi, a driving force in 'Tucumán Arde', was
emphatic about this. In a work titled Panfleto no.3. La nueva
moda (Pamphlet no.3. The New Fashion, 1971), which he
contributed to the 'Arte de Sistemas' exhibition organised by the
Museo de Arte Moderno/Centro de Arte y Comunicación in Buenos Aires
in 1971, he stated: 'What is in fashion now is Conceptual art […]
and it turns out that (at least for some critics like Lucy Lippard
and Jorge Glusberg) I am one of those responsible for the onset of
this phenomenon (together with my colleagues from the ex-groups of
revolutionary artists in Rosario and Buenos Aires from '67 to '68).
This assertion is mistaken. Just as any intention of linking us to
that aesthetic speculation is mistaken.' And he concludes:
'REGARDING OUR MESSAGES: 1. We are not interested in them being
considered aesthetic. 2. We structure them according to their
contents. 3. They are always political and are not always
transmitted by official channels like this one. 4. We are not
interested in them as works but as a means of denouncing
exploitation.'↑

The same reference to Marchán Fiz's 'ideological Conceptualism'
had already been made one year earlier by the North American critic
Jacqueline Barnitz in the catalogue of the exhibition 'Encounters/
Displacements. Luis Camnitzer, Alfredo Jaar, Cildo Meireles',
curated by Ramírez and Beverly Adams. However, Ramírez's voice was
the one that consolidated and furthered the argument most
effectively, making it an indispensable reference for many
subsequent interpretations. A decisive factor in this consolidation
was the repetition of the line of argument in the catalogue of
'Global Conceptualism' and later on in two large-scale
international surveys of Latin American art she was also in charge
of: 'Heterotopías. Medio siglo sin lugar 1918-1968' at the Museo
Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid in 2000; and 'Inverted
Utopias: Avant-Garde Art in Latin America' at Museum of Fine Arts,
Houston, in 2004. Marchán Fiz doesn't quite completely confine the
'ideologisation' to Conceptual art from Latin American nor
self-referentiality to European/North American work. See J.
Barnitz, 'Conceptual Art in Latin America: A Natural Alliance', in
M.C. Ramírez and B. Adams (ed.), Encounters/Displacements: Luis
Camnitzer, Alfredo Jaar, Cildo Meireles (exh. cat.), Austin:
Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery, University of Texas, 1992,
pp.35-47; M.C. Ramírez, 'Tactics for Thriving on Adversity:
Conceptualism in Latin America, 1960-1980', in L. Camnitzer, J.
Farver and R. Weiss (ed.), Global Conceptualism: Points of
Origin, 1950s-1980s (exh. cat.), op. cit., pp.53-71;
Simón Marchán Fiz, Del arte objetual al arte de concepto,
Madrid: Alberto Corazón Editor, 1974 [1972].↑

Historian Jaime Vindel has also noted the contradictions in
responding to the centre/periphery relationship through an equally
binary opposition: 'By basing their position on an antagonist with
no real voice, these discourses run the risk of making their
publicity dependent on the centre/periphery logic against which
they declare they stand and to which they are still yielding.' J.
Vindel, 'A propósito [de la memoria] del arte político:
Consideraciones en torno a "Tucumán Arde" como emblema del
conceptualismo latinoamericano', lecture given at the 5th
International Conference of Theory and History of the Arts - 13th
CAIA Symposium, Buenos Aires, October 2009.↑

In a 1997 text Camnitzer celebrated Ramírez's argument, which he
found enlightening for its understanding of the regional
differences of Conceptualism, which emphasised the relationship
between Duchamp and the modern tradition of Mexican muralism,
starting from its foray into the social sphere with communicative
goals. Broadly speaking, however, Camnitzer shares Ramírez's view
of North American Conceptual art, which he brands 'a quasi-mystical
search for the imponderable'. L. Camnitzer, 'Una genealogía del
arte conceptual latino-americano', Continente Sul Sur,
no.6, November 1997, p.187. Other historians who have used the
expression 'ideological Conceptualism' more or less critically over
the past few years include Andrea Giunta, Ana Longoni, María José
Herrera, Ivonne Pini, Miguel González, Cristina Freire and Alberto
Giudici. Due to problems of space, this text will not compare the
conflicting meanings and the implications inscribed in their
uses.↑

'A minor literature doesn't come from a minor language; it is
rather that which a minority constructs within a major language.
[…] The second characteristic of minor literatures is that
everything in them is political. Minor literature is completely
different; its cramped space forces each individual intrigue to
connect immediately to politics. […] We might as well say that
minor no longer designates specific literatures but the
revolutionary conditions for every literature within the heart of
what is called great (or established) literature.' Gilles Deleuze
and Félix Guattari, Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature
(trans. Dana B. Polan), Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press,
1986, pp.16-18.↑

In October 1968, in a newspaper and on local radio Vigo made the
surprising call for his first 'señalamiento'
('appointment') titled Manojo de Semáforos (A Handful
of Traffic Lights). The proposal called for people to look at
an ordinary object for its aesthetic potential to cause
'revulsion'. See F. Davis, 'Prácticas "revulsivas": Edgardo Antonio
Vigo en los márgenes del conceptualismo', in C. Freire and A.
Longoni (ed.), Conceitualismos do Sul/Sur, São Paulo:
Annablume, USP-MAC and AECID, 2009, pp.283-98.↑

'Inventario 1965-1975. Archivo Graciela Carnevale', Centro
Cultural Parque de España, Rosario (3 October-9 November 2008). The
team working on the show was made up of the artist Graciela
Carnevale, historians Ana Longoni and Fernando Davis, and Ana
Wandzik, an artist from Rosario. This project constituted the first
curatorial experiment in political activation by the Red
Conceptualismos del Sur group.↑

While its earliest mentions date back to the late 1960s, its
incorporation within the canon since the late 1990s, through a
series of essays, exhibitions and publications, quickly multiplied
its visibility. International exhibitions include I Bienal de Artes
Visuais do Mercosul in Porto Alegre, Brasil in 1997; 'Global
Conceptualism' in 1999 and 'Heterotopías' in 2000; 'Ambulantes.
Cultura Portátil' curated by Rosa Pera at CAAC, Seville; 'Inverted
Utopias' at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston in 2004; and 'Be what
you want but stay where you are', curated by Ruth Noack and Roger
M. Buergel at Witte de With, Rotterdam, 2005.↑

Even though the most prevalent reading of 'Tucumán Arde' places
it within the 'Conceptual' genealogy, others have tried to relate
it to a history of political intervention, collective production or
militant research. Examples of this are the dossier 'Les fils de
Marx et Mondrian: Dossier argentine', published in Robho
magazine (nos.5-6, 1971, pp.16-22) or anthropologist Néstor García
Canclini's discussion of 'Tucumán Arde' in the context of the
process of integration of artistic avant-gardes with popular
organisations. See N. García Canclini, 'Vanguardias artísticas y
cultura popular', Transformaciones, no.90, 1973,
pp.273-75. More recently, Brian Holmes has noted the impact this
experience had on several activist groups operating in Europe in
the late 1990s. See A. Longoni, Daniela Lucena et al., '"Un sentido
como el de Tucumán Arde lo encontramos hoy en el zapatismo":
Entrevista colectiva a Brian Holmes', Ramona, no.55,
October 2005, pp.7-22. Similar readings are proposed by exhibitions
such as 'Antagonismes. Casos d'estudi', curated by Manuel
Borja-Villel and José Lebrero at MACBA, Barcelona, 2001;
'Collective Creativity: Common Ideas for Life and Politics',
curated by What, How and for Whom at Kunsthalle Fridericianum,
Kassel in 2005 and the project ExArgentina, organised by
Alice Creischer and Andreas Siekmman.↑

The interviews were conducted by Mariano Mestman and A. Longoni;
some of them were eventually published in their book Del Di
Tella a 'Tucumán Arde'. Vanguardia artística y política en el '68
argentino, Buenos Aires: El cielo por asalto, 2000.↑

'Politics are only displayed by exposing the conflicts, the
paradoxes, the reciprocal clashes that weave history,' says
Didi-Huberman in his considerations of the Brechtian notion of
montage. '[M]ontage appears as the procedure par
excellence in this exposition: its objects are not revealed
when taking position but once they have been taken apart, as is
said in French to describe the violence of a "unbridled" storm,
wave against wave, or as is said of a watch "dismantled", i.e.
analysed, explored and therefore spread by the passion of knowing
applied by a philosopher or a Baudelairian child.' G.
Didi-Huberman, Cuando las imágenes toman posición, Madrid:
A. Machado Libros, 2008, p.153. Editors' translation.↑

See L. Camnitzer, Conceptualism in Latin American Art:
Didactics of Liberation, Austin: University of Texas Press,
2007, pp.44-72. Camnitzer, however, points at alternative
coordinates, such as the writings of nineteenth-century Venezuelan
writer and educator Simón Rodríguez, who taught Simón Bolívar. For
Camnitzer, the Tupamaros's use of 'aestheticised military
operations' and Rodríguez's 'ideological aphorisms' contribute to
what he calls a 'didactics of liberation': communication process
aimed at generating actual changes in society.↑

'Politics is a specific rupture in the logic of arche.
It does not simply presuppose the rupture of the "normal"
distribution of positions between the one who exercises power and
the one subject to it. It also requires a rupture in the idea that
there are dispositions "proper" to such classifications.' Jacques
Rancière, 'Dix thèses sur la politique', Aux Bords du
Politique, Paris: Gallimard, p.229.↑

Journal

Chon A. Noriega considers the work of Raphael Montañez Ortiz,
the founder of El Museo del Barrio in Harlem, whose film practice
highlighted the exclusion of minority and working class artists
from the canon.

Journal

Hélio Oiticica developed the concept of ‘tropicamp' in the text
‘MARIO MONTEZ, TROPICAMP' (1971) to critique the commercialisation
of the New York avant-garde. These notes contextualise the essay,
translated in this issue into English for the first time.

Journal

Inti Guerrero looks at the Brazilian architect Flávio de Carvalho's designs for a modern man of the tropics: a transgendered New Look that grew out of his interest in crowd psychology and studies of efficiency.

Journal

As Vilém Flusser put it in 1969, the Bienal de São Paulo is a
stubborn fact.1 Its recurrence since the first edition in 1951
lends it a semblance of perpetuity, and it is now a cultural event
that might be described in terms of 'always'...